156. Baking it Down - Class is Canceled

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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⛔ Class is Canceled - What to do when you need to cancel cookie class.

When you venture into the wild world of cookie classes, the last thing you want to do is consider canceling said cookie class. BUT - it's just a fact of life that even the most seasoned instructors will have to face a cookie class cancelation.

Heck - we've been doing this for years now and it still happens. No one's above it. So best that we all learn from it. And that's today's podcast, how to mitigate having to cancel, when to consider canceling, and how to cancel, and what to do after you have canceled a cookie class.

⬇️ Feel free to save this graphic for future reference - it's what we covered on the podcast ⬇️

🛑 When to Mitigation a Class Cancelation

Okay - before we go straight to canceling, I like to see if we can still sell the seats. We're going to have to get creative to fill seats last minute - and it may touch your profit margin a bit, but there are times when "the show must go on" is a better business move than walkin' away from a non-refundable room rental fee.

• 🛑 If someone has a sickness, give them a class credit / refund as quickly as possible - 🤧 we do not want to force their hand and have them come.
• 🛑 For reasons other than sickness, tell the canceling attendee, "If either of us can sell your ticket, I'll refund you." This way you're guaranteed a "one out, one in."
• 🛑 Offer Bo-Go to current class attendees (bring a friend, get a discount). We use this one - most folks have friends, it's a great way to fill seats + make the attendees have a better time.
• 🛑 Offer up free tickets to a community group (marketing cost now). This will be a 100% loss of ticket revenue, BUT it's a great marketing tactic to raise awareness for your classes to a local audience.
• 🛑 Ensure your "no-show policy" is really dialed in. You can't go back in time and write your no-show policies. Every few classes, we just have people literally not show up - and we never hear from them. They knew the no-show policy and respected it.

🤔 When to Consider Canceling

Okay - let's say we still can't move seats - it's now time to move to the "should I cancel this" phase. Hey - it happens. The sooner we act though, the better (but yes - there's a balancing act: cancel too soon, you could have sold those seats, cancel too late, you may get a (very small) mob of angry would-be class attendees.

• 🤔 Time Frame: before you bake (we do 7 days). Don't bake then cancel - you'll be out not only a potential room fee, processing fees, but also ingredients costs. Make that decision before you get to the kitchen.
• 🤔 Threshold - what are the minimum required signups to cover room costs? Sometimes your costs can still be covered even with a small crowd - so consider only canceling if you will be operating below your costs (room, ingredients, labor), otherwise - I'd keep the show goin'!
• 🤔 Don't focus on room capacity - focus on costs + profit. We see some posters write, "I only sold 50% of my tickets" but when asked about how many that is, that's 10 whole tickets (as in their venue could seat 20 people). Our 100% capacity is 10 tickets - so focus on costs and profit, not on a filled room.
• 🤔 Does the venue have a refund cut-off? Sometimes paid venues will let you out of your room fees if you cancel X days in advance - consider that when making the class "TOD" call.

❌ How to Cancel

Okay - now it's time to make the call - we are going to cancel. How do we go about this.